Afternoon on the links (April 9, 2013)Michigan looked like the smart pick for the first 16 minutes of last night's national championship game, but Louisville rallied and covered the four-point spread . Gimpy Kevin Ware cut down the net , and police in Louisville fired tear gas into raucous crowds of revelers. Is this video legit? It's a nifty trick if it is. A little closer to home, reporters say ExxonMobil is hindering coverage of the oil spill in Mayflower . On Monday, ExxonMobi...

ANO: Reactor restart "to take several weeks"LONDON — Arkansas Nuclear One officials said Thursday evening it will take "several weeks" to restart the facility's reactor, Unit 2, that was knocked offline when a 550-ton generator stator fell while it was being moved Sunday. "Ultimately, we are committed to restoring both units at ANO to full power operations,” site vice president Jeremy Browning said in a statement. “We have augmented our team with both corporate staff and outside experts...

ANO contractor issues statement on employee's death, IDs injured workerAn Indiana-based contractor said Wednesday one of its employees was killed and another injured after the workers helped "remove handrail in the travel path of a stator replacement project" at Arkansas Nuclear One. East Chicago, Ind.-based Precision Surveillance Corporation, which recently opened a fabrication and storage facility in Russellville, said in a statement its employees were at Arkansas Nuclear One to "perform a fuel transfer modific...

Afternoon on the links (April 3, 2013)Rutgers finally canned basketball coach Mike Rice after a video surfaced of Rice abusing players in practice. Rice was suspended for three games and fined $50,000 in December , which Rutgers AD Tim Pernetti said Wednesday was the wrong decision. Speaking of questionable choices, Arkansas head coach Bret Bielema did some one-upping of Alabama coach Nick Saban's record in the Big 10 . Saban, who's won three national championships at Alabama sinc...

Sheriff working to reopen Dardanelle jailDANVILLE — Yell County Sheriff Bill Gilkey says he plans to reopen the jail in Dardanelle that was closed last month after three inmates escaped . Gilkey said lack of funding prevented the Dardanelle facility from being sufficiently staffed. The jail was closed March 17 after two men, Seth Chowning and Bret Cooksey, overpowered a jailer while walking back into the jail from the exercise yard. The men then freed Jacqueline Stobaugh and all thre...

Pictures of ANO accident scene surface onlineImages of the 600-ton stator that fell Sunday morning, killing one man and injuring eight others, are beginning to surface online. Wade Walters, 24, of Russellville was killed Sunday when the stator, which was being moved as part of a planned upgrade at Arkansas Nuclear One, fell after a "turbine temporary lift device failed," according to a report on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission website. Funeral services for Walters, an avid outdoorsman ...

Afternoon on the links (April 1, 2013)Today is the one-year anniversary of Bobby Petrino's motorcycle tour, the first of many painful chapters in the story of the 2012 Razorback football season. Things are looking up on The Hill, however. A group of ducks impacted by oil that leaked into Lake Conway are in Russellville as conservation groups work to save animals affected by the ExxonMobil pipeline that burst in Mayflower . Twenty-two homes were evacuated because of the spill. Exxo...

NRC report: "Lift device failed," dropping 500-ton stator that killed ANO workerA report on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission website says a "turbine temporary lift device failed" while moving a 500-ton turbine generator stator at Arkansas Nuclear One, killing a Russellville man and injuring eight others Sunday morning. The accident that killed Wade Walters, 24, also disrupted power at the two-unit nuclear plant operated by Entergy near London, and the company said in a statement that both units are "in a stable shutdown ...

Russellville family escapes burning homeA woman and her two children escaped uninjured from their burning home on Frankfurt Avenue following a kitchen fire late Sunday night. Russellville firefighters responded to 1309 North Frankfort Avenue at 9:53 p.m. Sunday and extinguished a blaze that fire officials declared an accident resulting from "unattended cooking." A release from the Russellville Fire Department says the fire was confined to the home's kitchen and dining area, which su...

Afternoon on the links (March 29, 2013)From today's New York Times comes a story about what could have been for Arkansas basketball if Dana Altman had stayed more than one day. Altman and the Oregon Ducks play the tournament's No. 1 overall seed Louisville tonight in Sweet 16 action. Charles Barkley came to co-host Doug Gottlieb's defense Thursday night after Gottlieb said he was there to offer "kind of the white man’s perspective" while working with Sir Charles, Greg Gumbel, Greg ...

Bye, bye B.J.: Young declares for NBA draftB.J. Young announced via Twitter he is declaring for this summer's NBA draft. Young will join forward Marshawn Powell, who announced he would leave the Razrorbacks earlier this week , in the June draft. Read more about Young's decision here . With the departure of Powell and Young, forward Coty Clarke is the team’s top returning scorer and rebounder after averaging 7.6 points and 5.2 rebounds his first season.

Afternoon on the links (March 28, 2013)It's the afternoon somewhere. The Miami Heat couldn't win 28 in a row when they visited Chicago Wednesday night. It was the Heat's first loss since Feb. 1 , and Lebron James felt slighted by the officials following Wednesday's hard-fought contest. Dogpatch USA, the long-defunct but once-beloved theme park right up the road in Marble Falls, made its way onto the Weather Channel's list of "creepy abandoned theme parks." Dogpatch opened in Newton...

Two arrested for meth in DardanelleDARDANELLE — The Yell County Sheriff's Department said Tuesday it arrested two men at a duplex here for possession of methamphetamine and marijuana with intent to deliver. According to the department's Facebook page, Rodney Crenshaw and Donald A. Roach Jr. were arrested Saturday in the duplex they apparently shared. Police did not say what amount of either substance was seized from the duplex, but said a .45 caliber pistol was confiscated. Cre...

Local DTF coordinator dies following foot chaseCLARKSVILLE — The Fifth Judicial District Drug Task Force coordinator died Tuesday night following a foot chase with a parolee, a source with the Clarksville Police Department said. Fort Smith-based KFSM reported Larry Johnson, 65, of Clarksville died after chasing a Clarksville man who fled police during a home visit. Officers on the scene said Johnson collapsed while chasing the man. Clarksville police chief Greg Donaldson said the parolee, ...

Afternoon on the links (March 26, 2013)I'm not much of a golfer, but I love spending time on golf courses. If I'm on the course, the weather is nice and the grass is green. I like the quiet and open air. There's plenty of space between your group and the next, and there's no posted speed limit. I'll periodically post collections of links under the title "Afternoon on the links." All sorts of links, too, but mostly important men's topics like sports, technology, the outdoors and tom...

Walmart expanding "Scan & Go" programWalmart is expanding the "Scan & Go" program it launched late last year in Northwest Arkansas. Thirteen stores in Bentonville, Rogers, Fayetteville and Springdale allow shoppers to use their iPhones, iPads and iPods to scan items and pay for them at self-checkout counters. Walmart is rolling out the mobile shopping experience at stores in Oklahoma (Tulsa and Oklahoma City), Texas (Dallas and Austin), Denver and several other cities in the west...

Public notices should be in local newspapersThe Associated Press featured this story from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette about opposition to a permit granted to a industrial pig farm located on a tributary of the Buffalo River near Mount Judea in Newton County. Here's the gem: Much of the public outcry stems from the perception that the (Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality) did nothing to alert local residents that a confined animal-feeding-operation permit was being considered ...

Johnson Co. deputy pleads not guilty to perjury chargeA Johnson County Sheriff's deputy entered a not guilty plea on Friday after she was charged with perjury last month. Sgt. Glenda Morrison, the wife of Johnson County Sheriff Jimmy Dorney, is accused of lying under oath when Circuit Court Judge William Pearson questioned her Oct. 15 regarding statements she allegedly made to jurors during the murder trial of a Dardanelle man, the Southwest Times Record of Fort Smith reported . In October, Tommy...

Infant dies in Coal Hill homeCLARKSVILLE — The Johnson County Sheriff's Office said a four-month-old female died in her Coal Hill home last week. A release from Sheriff Jimmy Dorney's office said the child's parents found her unresponsive at approximately 4:25 p.m. on March 14. After discovering the child was not breathing, the parents called 911. "The cell-phone call was routed to Logan County where dispatchers instructed the parents on CPR while transferring the call to...

Overreaching UA-ASU bill unlikely to clear committeeA bill that would mandate a football game between the University of Arkansas-Fayetteville and Arkansas State University is unlikely to make it out of committee, state Rep. Andrea Lea wrote in an email this morning. Lea said she was appreciative of provisions in the bill that would require some proceeds from the game be donated to a charitable cause, but otherwise suggested the matter was not "something the Legislature should involve themselves...